


a moment that will last 'til the end

by carrieevew



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Childhood Friends, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-02
Updated: 2017-11-02
Packaged: 2019-01-28 15:08:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12609360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carrieevew/pseuds/carrieevew
Summary: “Damsel in distress looking for a knight in shining armour. What can you do?” Bellamy read off the screen. “Are you fucking kidding me?! You cannot sell me on eBay!” he shouted.“Not with that attitude I can’t,” Octavia chirped.“Seriously, O,” he sighed, “I may have lost my faith in them after the jar of poop but I’m pretty sure even they would frown upon human trafficking.”But Octavia just sent him a flat glare. “Well, I don’t see you coming up with any better ideas."or: Bellamy needs help with an unexpected problem and ends up finding it in the strangest of places.





	a moment that will last 'til the end

**Author's Note:**

> this is based on a story that James Blunt once told on Top Gear ([Series 10 Episode 8](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1150889/?ref_=ttqt_qt_tt)), about how his sister met her husband (and [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dI80pKjO3g) is a brief summary), which is just ridiculous enough to have made me think it would make a good fic. hope i was right.
> 
> therefore, the title is from [_"You're Beautiful"_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oofSnsGkops) by James Blunt.
> 
> enjoy!

“Yo, Bell!” Octavia yelled, coming into Bellamy’s house without even bothering to knock. He would’ve sighed but it’s not like he could’ve blamed anyone but himself for her lack of manners.

He got up from his desk and was coming down the stairs when she addressed him again. 

“I hope you’re not developing a sudden claustrophobia,” she said and he heard a dull thud of her heavy boots hitting the hardwood floor of his hallway, “‘cause it looks like we’re stuck on this fucking rock for the unforeseen future.”

Now, that got his attention alright.

“The fuck you’re talking about, O?" he asked, annoyed, his voice raised. She better be joking. 

Bellamy rushed downstairs as Octavia kept talking.

“I ran into Murphy on my way home from work. Apparently, Jasper and Monty got high the other night and tried to set off some sort of a firework display in the marina. They hit the deck and it had to be closed.”

“What?!”

“Yeah, Murphy says Jaha went nuts when he saw it. He started screaming about locking them up in a box and shooting them into the Sun because—and it’s a direct quote—those delinquents need to be thought a lesson. 

“I’m telling ya, that man is getting crazier by the minute. Someone needs take that mayor office away from him or one day, he’s gonna try and declare independence of Arcadia.”

Octavia came into the living room, throwing her jacket haphazardly on the couch. 

Bellamy must’ve stayed silent for too long, running his hands through his hair nervously because as soon as his sister saw him, she sent him an utterly unimpressed look.

“Geez, Bell, what’s wrong with you? You wouldn’t leave this island for weeks if you didn’t have to and now you’re acting like you’re stuck in a leper colony. The school will find a sub for you and I can promise you, they won’t break your precious students. You should enjoy your snow day,” Octavia said with a dismissive wave of her hand but Bellamy let out a weak yelp and she screwed her face.

Eleven months out of twelve, Bellamy loved living on the tiny island of Arcadia, a few miles off the coast of Maine. They had one small town surrounded by a couple dozens of bungalows that filled up with tourists looking for a quiet vacation every year and then emptied out as soon as the season ended. His family lived there for a few generations now. His mother used to run a small tailor shop but he and his sister decided to close it down after Aurora had died, neither one of them interested in working there. Back then, he’d just come back from college with a shiny new teaching degree and Octavia... 

Well, to be honest, Bellamy remained constantly surprised that she was still here. Her senior year of high school, she used to tell everyone who’d wanted to listen that she’d run away to see the world as soon as possible and true to her world, Octavia did leave right after graduation. However, after two years on the mainland, she came back to Arcadia with a tattooed giant of a boyfriend, and then she and Lincoln opened a small gym in town. 

Now, six years later, she was still here and Bellamy was still teaching history in a high school on the mainland. However, all the love he had for his home island didn’t change the fact that it was still practically cut off from the rest of the world, save for a small deck and one boat operated by one Emori Murphy, who was also in charge of stocking up their shops. And, as it would seem, the two of his most infamous students decided to disturb the peace during the one weekend when he needed to leave with their shenanigans.

Bellamy rubbed his face and let out a tired sigh.

“I’m not worried about my student, O,” he said. “But I have a meeting with a publisher on Monday at nine, remember? The only one interested in my book?”

Octavia’s eyes went wide as she connected the dots and Bellamy dropped heavily onto the couch, landing on her jacket. He pulled it from under him and leaned against the back of the couch. “I was supposed to leave on Sunday afternoon, get a hotel in the city and go to that meeting first thing in the morning. 

“But with the deck out of order, I can’t get to Emori’s boat and without the boat, I can’t get to the mainland in the first place.” 

Bellamy spent the last two years polishing his first novel until one night he got drunk with Miller and finally decided it wouldn’t get any better and sent it to a handful of publishers. After a few weeks, one of them responded and he’d been invited for a meeting with a possible editor to have a conversation about the book’s future. 

He’d been stressed enough about as it was but now, he was about to expire. 

Figures, he thought to himself. Apparently, it wasn’t in his future to become a published author. 

 

***

 

Fighting off disappointment, Bellamy spent the rest of the Saturday afternoon grading a stack of essays. Just as he started to see double, his sister stormed into the living room with a laptop in her hand and plopped down next to him, placing the computer on top of the papers, on the coffee table in front of him. 

“You’re about to love me even more, big brother,” she announced with a smug smile, pointing to the screen. “I’ve got a great idea.”

“ _Damsel in distress looking for a knight in shining armour. What can you do?_ ” Bellamy read off the screen. “Are you fucking kidding me?! You cannot sell me on eBay!” he shouted, waving his hand in the general direction of an auction that his sister had just set up. There was a fairly clear description of his current situation and a disclaimer that whatever they earn will be donated to Planned Parenthood. And, to his utter shock, already quite a few bids.

“Not with that attitude I can’t,” Octavia chirped.

“Seriously, O,” he sighed, “I may have lost my faith in them after the jar of poop but I’m pretty sure even they would frown upon human trafficking.”

But Octavia just sent him a flat glare. “Well, I don’t see you coming up with any better ideas. Besides, I’m not selling you, just—a problem to solve,” she shrugged. “If it doesn’t work then it doesn’t. But it won’t make your situation any worse, would it?”

Yeah, he didn’t have a good answer to that.

 

***

 

“I’m not sure if I’m supposed to feel disturbed or glad about how many people are interested in helping me,” Bellamy mused as he watched the new bids coming in with an unbelievable frequency.

“I’m sure at least half of them are just in it as a joke,” Octavia answered, not looking up from the game she was playing on her phone. “So, half disturbed?” She smirked and Bellamy chuckled.

When the auction ended at midnight, it was Octavia who had the computer in her lap.

“And the winner is—” Octavia drum rolled against the arm rest. “Oh.”

“What is it now?” Bellamy asked with a groan, coming back from the kitchen with a couple of beers. “Don’t tell me your plan backfired.”

Octavia narrowed her eyes at him, pursing her lips. 

“That all depends on how desperate you really are,” she finally said and handed him the computer. “Cause our helpful winner is Clarke Griffin.”

Bellamy’s brow furrowed at the sound of a name he hadn’t heard in some eight years. The Princess of Ark High used to be Octavia’s bio tutor their senior year and she and Bellamy hadn’t had the easiest relationship.

Admittedly, it was a stupid move of him to get pissed at her for offering to help Octavia for free and keep her from flunking the lab. But then, she didn’t exactly roll over either and they spent almost a year arguing every time they saw each other. Slowly but surely, it turned into a good-natured bickering though and by the time Clarke and Octavia graduated, they were almost—friendly. 

She left for an Ivy League college then, on a sure and clear path to a brilliant career and he hadn’t seen her since. Nor, as far as he knew, had his sister.

“Don’t be dramatic, O. We weren’t that bad.”

“Oh, but you were!” Octavia laughed. “I used to wonder if I should hide all of our knives whenever she came over. You know, just in case.”

“Funny,” Bellamy deadpanned. “Alright, come on, what brilliant idea does she have?”

“I don’t actually know,” Octavia answered, squinting at the screen. “She just sent me an email saying that she’ll be waiting for you at ten tomorrow morning, on the field behind Tor Lemkin’s house. Okay, yeah, that’s cryptic.”

She frowned but Bellamy just snorted.

“She just bought herself an opportunity to basically become my chauffer.” The ridiculousness of this entire situation was not lost on him. “I believe I deserve all the teasing as she can muster.

“And besides, if the Princess needed organs, she could probably still afford to just hit the black market, right? This is way too much trouble just for one set,” Bellamy joked and his sister almost chocked on her beer.

 

***

 

To be completely honest, Bellamy wasn’t sure what he expected from this whole arrangement. Waking up on Sunday morning, he was half-convinced that Clarke decided to get him for all the fights they had in the past and he’d just arrive to an empty field.

Packing up for the next couple of days, he thought maybe she found a crew to work all throughout the night to repair the deck. Or that she had a dingy waiting by the beach and they’d have to row all the way to the shore.

Or maybe she knew someone with an access to teleportation technology… yeah, okay, he was definitely overthinking it.

Then, as Octavia dropped him off at the Lemkins’ a couple of hours later, the thing he saw never actually made the list.

And yet there she was. The very same girl that used to send him death glares every time he smirked at her dismissively or tried to mess up her hair, now a young woman with a smirk of her own.

And a _fucking helicopter_.

She pushed away from the side of the helicopter that she was leaning against, pushing the reflective aviator sunglasses she was wearing up the top of her hair and came over to him, a smile spreading over her face.

Her hair was shorter that he’d ever seen her wearing, with red streaks peeking out from between the blond curls framing her face. Her features sharpened over the years but she was still the same Clarke who used to slap his hands away when he tried to mess with her hair back in the day.

“Bellamy Blake, as I live and breathe!” Clarke laughed and embraced him in a quick hug, his own arms coming around her without much input from his brain. She was still smiling when they disentangled and Clarke gestured for him to follow her and showed where to put his bag.

Bellamy has never been a fan of flying and the rather small machine she’d brought didn’t inspire much confidence in him but there was something in the way she moved around as she shown him how to fasten his seatbelt and handed him a headset to put on; she knew what she was doing. But then, that, as far as he remembered, had always been the Clarke Griffin way. Never met a skill she didn’t want to perfect.

The roar of the engine only added to the deafening rush of blood in his ears, so Bellamy only gave her a thumbs-up when Clarke asked if he were ready to go and off they went.

He relaxed gradually during the flight, enough to actually look outside the window and appreciate the land and waterscapes from a whole new perspective. And before he knew it, they were landing in Portland already.

“Come on,” Clarke called out to him once Bellamy finally jumped out of the craft, hoping she didn’t notice that his legs wobbled like a newly-born foal’s. Bellamy grabbed both of their bags and followed her to a nearby parking lot. “We’ve still got a couple of hours of driving ahead of us before we get to Boston.”

“Yeah, you don’t have to take me all the way there, Clarke. This is already too much,” he protested but Clarke just shook her head and kept on walking. “You can just drop me off at the train station or something.”

“Oh, and do you have the whole time table memorised, or are you just gonna try your luck?” She stopped a few feet in front of him and turned around to face him, arms crossed and a smug, knowing smile on her lips. “I promised your sister to get you to that meeting and that’s what I’m going to do.”

Bellamy dropped his head in resignation and gestured for her to go on.

“Besides,” Clarke added over her shoulder once she started walking, “I paid handsomely for the pleasure of your company, I’m not giving up on that.”

“Oh, I’m never gonna live that down,” Bellamy grumbled, eyes raised to the sky.

“Nope!”

 

***

 

The drive in Clarke’s car was incomparably quieter than the flight, which created the perfect opportunity for the awkward silence to settle between them.

Clarke, at least, had the benefit of acting like she was too focused on the road to think of conversation starters but Bellamy didn’t have anything else to do but to count the quickly-passing mile markers.

He looked over to Clarke, who was humming along to a song he didn’t recognise playing from the stereo, her fingers drumming on the steering wheel. She must’ve felt his gaze because she shot him a quick glance, her lips tugging upwards softly and he could’ve sworn he saw a faint blush crawling up her neck.

“So,” he started, his voice pitched higher than a teenager during mutation and he cleared his throat. Wow. To think he actually makes a living by _talking_ to people the whole day. One cute girl should not be able to make him this tongue-tied.

“How often do you go on the internet looking for people in trouble, so you could come from above and save them?” He finally asked and felt rather pleased when she let out a surprised bark of laughter. Just like she used to, every time he made her laugh in spite of herself.

“Actually, my roommate found you. She was looking for some car parts to buy in the neighbourhood. She showed it to me as a joke but as soon as I read it, I just knew it was you and I had to win that one.”

“Oh, and what was it that gave me away? Was it the utter desperation seeping from ever word?”

“Sure,” she chuckled, glancing over to him again once again. “And Octavia called you ‘my brother Bell’. Considering her screen name is AugustusSister, it was a pretty safe bet.”

Bellamy nodded and finally, the beginning of her story caught up to him.

“I didn’t know you were still in the neighbourhood,” he said, feeling an unexpected and quite silly pang of disappointment. Why would he know that? They haven’t spoken in almost a decade.

“That’s because you never needed to be airlifted to a hospital,” she shot back. Noticing his eyebrows furrowed in in confusion, she added, “I’m a flight paramedic at the Maine Medical Centre in Portland.”

“I thought you’d be on your way out of a med school right about now.”

“Yeah, so did my mom.” She rolled her eyes. “I did graduate from pre-med and I was about to apply to med schools but then, um—my dad died.” Clarke swallowed. “I kinda spiralled then and I missed all the deadlines. My mother said she could help me get around that but I realised that I don’t actually wanted her to. I didn’t want to be a doctor. So, I certified as an EMT and boom, here I am.”

“And then what, you just woke up one day and decided to switch and ambulance for something that can get you through the traffic faster?”

“Yeah, kind of,” she shook her head with a smile. “My dad taught me how to fly shortly before he—” she cleared her throat, one of her hands rubbing at her cheek slowly. “He used to fly for the military in the 90s and he had this old helicopter he loved and pampered. My mother wanted to sell it after dad was gone but I just couldn’t. It’s way too big and it swallows fuel like crazy but—” she stopped herself.

“Sorry, I’m rambling, I know,” she sent Bellamy and apologetic smile. “What about you? Still teaching, right? Or maybe you already have a grand international writing career under some ridiculous pseudonym?”

“No, that would be my first book. If they actually want it,” he said, uncertain and rubbed his hand on the back of his neck.

“And I wouldn’t give up teaching, it’s been—well, I wouldn’t say _fun_. But it is very satisfying to read an occasional well-written essay.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” she said, amused.

“So, tell me, Professor Blake, how many young souls have fallen madly in love with you so far?”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, not you, too!” Bellamy groaned and Clarke laughed, laud and brilliant.

The conversation went on from there and before long, they were greeted but the Boston architecture.

 

***

 

She took him sightseeing.

When they arrived at Bellamy’s hotel, it was still relatively early, so they dropped his bad in his room and went for a walk around Old Town, and Clarke took him to all her favourite placed that she discovered during her four years in Harvard.

“Yeah, that probably should’ve been my first clue, you know,” she said to him over burgers. There was some ketchup on left on her lip and Bellamy had to stop himself from running his thumb over it and wiping it off.

“I used to walk all the way here from the campus, just to get away from all the studying. I did enjoy the medicine, I still do, but the pressure was unbearable and it only got worse, the closer we were to graduation,” Clarke explained and Bellamy nodded with understanding. He had a handful of pre-meds in his Latin class and come finals, they all turned into zombies who, he was pretty sure, would actually sleep in the library.

“Alright, I’ve been telling you my life story for hours now, it’s your turn.”

“Yeah, there really isn’t much to tell, not much changed since we last saw each other, Princess,” Bellamy said, the old nickname slipping out. He noticed Clarke narrowing her eyes at him he worried that he might’ve fucked up but she just threw her balled up paper napkin at his face.

“Oh, how I hated that!” Clarke laughed and shook her head a little.

“Well, to be fair, you were a bit of a princess, you can’t deny that,” Bellamy shot and threw the napkin back at her. Except, she ducked before it reached her, so it flew straight into the back of a guy sitting at the table behind them.

They both froze for a second, awaiting his reaction but he never even noticed. Clarke turned back around, facing Bellamy once again, a hand covering her mouth, her shoulders shaking form supressing laughter.

“And you’re still an asshole,” she countered in a very loud whisper, resting her elbows on the table, bringer her upper body closer to him. “Let’s just say we’re even.

“Seriously, though? _Nothing_ interesting has happened in the life of Bellamy Blake in eight years?”

Bellamy shrugged but Clarke shook her head in disbelief. “I’m not buying it, that island of yours is like something you only see in tv shows and can’t ever believe it actually exists in real life.”

“Yeah, but that’s something you would have to come over for and experience it yourself, the ridiculousness gets lost in translation,” he said, a warm smile lifting the corners of him mouth. And only as Bellamy heard the last of his words did he realise that he just asked her over for a visit, even though nowhere during this trip had they discussed it being anything more than a one-time deal.

“The most interesting thing that I did was write that book,” he changed the subject quickly.

“Tell me about it, then,” Clarke encouraged as they got up and walked away from their table, continuing on their journey.

And so, he did.

They walked through the city while he told her how long it took him to go form coming up with the idea of the plot to actually writing down a single word. How he used to write down ideas on post-it notes and stick them it his school text books so that he wouldn’t lose them.

She listened with interest as he complained about editing and continuously finding some typos and she laughed when he confessed to printing several pages on the backs of a few of his students’ tests.

As they walked, the sun had set, the afternoon turned into a rather cold evening and they reached his hotel once again.

Clarke hugged him tightly when they said their goodnights and she was about to leave to go spend the night at her college friend’s place.

“Good luck tomorrow,” she said into his neck and moved away, her hands still resting on his shoulders. “And call me as soon as you get out of it, ok?” Clarke gestured for him to give her his phone and she quickly saved her number into his contacts.

He stood there, watching as she drove off into the night in her car and realised that in all that time they spent together, he didn’t once worry about the meeting, even though, up until this morning, it scared the daylight out of him.

 

***

 

The meeting with the publisher was—surreal. He had absolutely no idea what to expect from it and his heart was beating so loudly the whole time that he’s pretty sure he couldn’t even hear about a half what was said but he left the place with a sighed deal and a promised from an editor that she’d get back to him with her notes within the next few weeks.

He pulled his phone and sent a quick _done with the meeting, went well, talk to you when I get back_ text to Octavia before scrolling down his contact list, looking for Clarke’s name.

He smiled to himself when he noticed the crown emoji she added at the end.

Clarke picked up after just a couple of rings with a very excited “Tell me what happened” and promised to get to him as quickly as possible.

When she arrived not even fifteen minutes later, he eyed her suspiciously and asked how many traffic violations she collected but she dismissed him with a wave of her hand.

“Everyone’s still alive, I’m good. And there are more important things to discuss now,” Clarke hurried him and squealed when he showed her the paperwork.

“I wish I could take you somewhere to celebrate but I have a shift tomorrow morning and I’m pretty sure if I don’t deliver you back home soon, your sister would send out a search party,” she joked. “But I can take you for a really good lunch, though, what do you think?” She asked, a little uncertain and Bellamy agreed quickly.

She probably could’ve offered him a tour of the closest landfill and he would’ve said yes, not wanting to part ways with her just yet.

 

***

 

They were speeding towards Portland when Bellamy shook himself awake and heard Clarke chuckling at him from the driver’s seat. He rolled his eyes and she grinned a brilliant smile at him.

She was humming to a song playing on the radio while he texted with his sister. Well, more like she detailed everything that happened in the 30-ish hours since he left with him sending only a sporadic _okay_ back to her.

“You know, you don’t have to take me all the way back home,” Bellamy said to Clare at one point, scratching the back of his head.

“Oh?”

“Yeah, I mean, Octavia says the deck still isn’t fixed, so I guess I should probably just find some cheap hotel near the school for a few days and hope no-one notices that I’ve been mix-matching the same two outfits for as long as possible,” he explained and if he hadn’t been looking directly at her, he wouldn’t have noticed her face falling for a fraction of a second before she schooled it back into order.

“Right, sure, whatever you want,” Clarke assure him, her voice a little overly casual and yeah, that probably sounded a little like he couldn’t wait to get away from her. Which was about the last thing he ever wanted her to think.

“I just—I don’t want to inconvenience you any more than necessary,” Bellamy hurried to tell her. “You’ve already saved my life enough as it is. And paid for it. I probably owe you a lifetime of favours, seriously. If you ever need help burying a body, keep in mind that I know places that won’t be uncovered by the tide for another—oh, couple hundred years, at least,” he babbled and that pulled a soft snort out of her.

“Okay, so we’re not flying back to Arkadia,” Clarke agreed after a heartbeat, “and for the sake of your ego, I’m gonna pretend it’s not because you were scared like a baby.” She grinned, turning to him for a moment and Bellamy couldn’t help smiling back at her. “How about we just keep driving?”

He was about to protest and say that it was still way too much but she cut him off before he even begun.

“Nope, no arguing.” She shook her head. “That would actually work out perfectly for me. My mother still lives in the same neighbourhood so I can drop by, stay a while and then genuinely tell her I need to get back home.”

“You two don’t get along?” he asked carefully, hoping that he hadn’t crossed a line. She hadn’t mention her mother all that much before.

“No, we’re fine but she’s just getting married and I can’t handle that shit.” She let out a heavy sigh but then blinked a few times and straightened up in her seat. “Nope, that came out wrong. I’m glad that she’s happy but she wants to have such a huge party! There are all those people involved, her wedding planner is practically a drill sergeant and I feel like my brain might bleed out of my ears if I stay with them too long.” Another sigh.

“Yeah, I just can’t with them. But if I come in for a couple of hours, I can just give her my opinion on things and leave before Major Byrne comes in to tell me, in detail, exactly how wrong I am,” Clarke continued in a very heavy voice but there was a smile dancing on her lips. “Believe it or not, I’m cashing in on some of those favours you promised me,” she said with a quick wink.

“Well then, Princess, by all means. Let _me_ help _you_ ,” he acquiesced graciously, which earned him another burst of laughter and he felt a little bit of warmth spreading in his belly.

 

***

 

When they eventually said their goodbyes, in the parking lot of a somewhat shady-looking motel, Clarke hugged him again and made him promise that he’d stay on touch. He agreed to in without a second thought but as the tail lights of her car disappeared from his sight, he couldn’t have helped but wonder what reason would he have to come up with to keep that promise.

Luckily—well, that would depend on one’s point of view, his doubts evaporated once he entered his room and noticed the colourful bed cover. He took a quick picture of it and texted it to Clarke. _Is it just me, or does it look like all those colours are only there to cover up the blood stains?_

She answered a couple hours later, with a picture of seven forks and a caption: _how are they all from different sets? those are all EXACTLY THE SAME!!!!!!!!!!_

Bellamy snorted and they talked for a while before he settled in for the night with the contract he’s signed that morning, ready to re-read it properly. After all, if he’d promised his first-born to anyone, it might be good to know that as soon as possible.

 

***

 

Octavia called him the next day during lunch break and announced that the deck had been fixed and blessed by Jaha’s watchful eye, so he could come back to Arkadia anytime he wanted. She also waited for him at the marina when he squeezed from between various boxes of supplies that Emori had been hired to transport. Apparently, his fellow islanders had decided to stock up for an apocalypse.

His sister demanded a play-by-play from his visit to Boston and hugged the life out of him when he’d shown her the contract. She also stayed suspiciously quiet while Bellamy told her about all the time he’d spent sight-seeing with Clarke, smiling like she’d knows a secret no one else had even heard of yet. And that never ended well with Octavia.

 

***

 

About a month later, they were well into their preparation for the town’s Thanksgiving feast when Octavia looked her brother straight in the eye and asked casually how Clarke was.

“She’s—fine,” Bellamy answered, growing suspicious. “Why?”

The two of them were in charge of borrowing chairs, tables and table clothes from anyone who could spare any and delivering them to the reception hall in the town hall. They were on their last run now and were placing the chairs around the tables when Octavia sat down on one of them and settled in for a conversation.

“Oh, I’m just curious,” his sister answered, a vision of fake innocence. “Can’t I just be curious about my former classmate, whom I haven’t seen in so, so many years?”

“No. No, _you_ can’t,” he said, wary. “You don’t get curious, you get cunning and conspiratorial, and it always ends with a headache for me.”

“Wow, Bell, dramatic much?” she snorted. “I just want to know what is going on with the very nice, very beautiful girl who helped you make the first big step towards making your dream come true, who took you on a trip straight from your fantasies, and whose text have been making you blush like a schoolboy with a crush.

“Except you’ve never behaved like that, even when you were in school so pardon me for being interested in the person who managed to steal all of your cool,” she finished with a smirk so smug that made Bellamy wish for a sudden and unexpected lightning to strike him and get him out of this conversation.

“I d—” He considered arguing all of her very-thinly veiled hints but to be honest, there hadn’t ever been much of a point of denying anything to Octavia, whenever she got that serious about something. Especially if she wasn’t being wrong. So instead, he just took the seat opposite of Octavia and rested his elbows on his lap.

“Why would you think I have a crush on Clarke? You’ve seen us together for all of two minutes.”

“I _know_ it because you told me, Bell.” Octavia’s voice went soft. She put a hand on his forearm and squeezed gently. “I heard how you spoke about her, big brother, and I don’t think you’ve _ever_ been this excited about someone, and definitely not since you and Gina broke up after college.” She looked genuine enough and Bellamy let out a heavy breath.

“Fine. Clarke is doing perfectly alright. She’s keeping busy at work, she’s coming back home to have a thanksgiving dinner with her mother and her mom’s fiancé and then she’s going back to work,” Bellamy spat it all out almost on a single breath and Octavia grinned triumphantly.

“And you two haven’t seen each other since, right?”

“You know, we haven’t, O,” Bellamy confirmed, confused. “What is this about?”

“Oh, nothing,” she dismissed him quickly and that only made him more suspicious. She was plotting something, there was no doubt.

“You clearly feel that you just have to do something, but could you at least promise to _try_ not to go overboard?” Bellamy get up from his chair and went back to work.

“Oh, I promise, I will not make run screaming for the hills,” Octavia assured him. She bounced up from her seat and joined Bellamy at his side. “Don’t worry about it!” she winked.

Yeah, like that’s gonna happen.

 

***

 

The Arkadia Thanksgiving feast has always been one of Bellamy’s favourite traditions. The town had been doing it since he was a kid and year after year, more and more people had been coming in. It all started almost three decades ago when a sudden snowfall cut the island form the mainland and several families, who were supposed to leave and visit their families, were stranded with no supplies.

The town organised quickly and within few hours there was a big communal dinner ready and since then, whoever stayed on the island during Thanksgiving was invited to join their neighbours and encouraged to bring some food of their own.

Aurora used to bake pies by a dozen, ready to feed everyone till Christmas and after her death, Bellamy had taken over, although he greatly reduced the number of baked goods.

Early Thursday afternoon, Octavia came in to his house to help him transport the pies to the reception hall and then dropped him back home as quickly as possible, saying that she had some very important errand to run, and practically ran away, yelling that she’ll meet him at the town hall and six.

He was left alone and slightly confused in his front yard but just shrugged it off. His sister truly enjoyed having her little mysteries and secret missions, always liked to meddle and usually if was simply easier to just stay out of her way and let the situation play out.

He had a few hours left to kill before he needed to get ready and leave for the dinner, so he grabbed his laptop and decided to go through the latest notes his editor sent to him. They’ve been emailing about his book quite regularly and every new message made him feel all the more confident because so far, they were pretty much in agreement about the need and direction of any changes. It felt like maybe his book had a chance.

***

When Bellamy go to the town hall, there were some fifty people already there, and more were coming in. He looked around the room and noticed Lincoln standing in the corner with his cousin Luna, who came in for a visit. Octavia, however, was nowhere to be seen.

He made his way toward his de-facto brother-in-law, who waved at him with a hint of an apology in his eyes.

“Let me guess, Octavia will be here in a moment, she’s got some fantastic surprise planned out and you’re not allowed to tell me what it is,” Bellamy said in lieu of a greeting and Lincoln just shrugged with a weak smile.

“Uh huh, right.” Bellamy turned to Luna. “Sorry about that. Hi.”

“Oh, that’s perfectly alright,” she said, looking very amused. “To be fair though, I have also been sworn to secrecy, even though I’m not entirely sure I know what’s going on. But your sister seemed quite certain that you’re going to enjoy yourself, if that makes you feel any better.”

“Yeah, you’d think so,” he sighed and both Luna and Lincoln chuckled. Octavia could be a lot to handle sometimes and it didn’t usually take people long to realise that.

“I guess you’re about to find out,” Lincoln said, jerking his head towards the door, where Octavia lingered, scanning the crowd. A smug smile spread across her face when she noticed her brother. She hurried to join them and hooked her arm around his elbow, turning them both around, so they were facing the entrance.

“You owe me,” she said under her breath and waved her hand towards the door, telling him to just watch.

He looked at the entrance, slightly puzzled, as a middle-aged couple came into the room. The woman seemed somewhat familiar to him but they both made their way to Mrs. Kane, who looked absolutely delighted to see them both. She had only moved to the island during the previous summer to, in her own words, live out her days in harmony with mother nature. Which meant that the man was most likely her only son, some big-shot lawyer. So, maybe the woman visited before and that’s how he knew her?

“It’s very nice that Mrs. Kane’s family is visiting her but I fail to understand why you were keeping it a secret from me,” Bellamy said, bumping his elbow into Octavia’s side.

“That’s only because you don’t follow the town gossip,” she explained with an eye roll and let go of his arm, pushing his forward a little. He wanted to say something to her in response, even opened his mouth to do so but then all the words flew right out of his head.

He watched with mouth agape as Clarke Griffin came through the door, her eyes on him within seconds. She wore a dark green dress, the skirt flowing around her knees when she stopped and smiled at him.

“Close your mouth, you’re gonna catch a fly,” his sister teased, standing at his side and looking like the cat who got the canary. Bellamy sent her a dirty look but shut his mouth and started moving ahead.

Clarke met him halfway and there was a beautiful blush on her cheeks, growing even darker as he reached for her and enveloped her in a tight hug.

“Don’t get me wrong, because I’m really glad to see you, but what are you doing here?” he asked when they separated and Clarke let out a short burst of laughter. “I thought you were spending Thanksgiving with your mom.”

“I actually am,” she said, pointing to the couple talking to Mrs. Kane and then it clicked, what Octavia’s jab about town gossip meant. After all, he did hear something about Mrs. Kane’s hot-shot lawyer son getting married to a hot-shot doctor. To Clarke’s mother. Whom he kind of recognised because he’d seen her a handful of times when Clarke and Octavia were still in school.

“I feel like I already know the answer, but did my sister have anything to do with it?” Bellamy asked, pointing to Octavia with his thumb, not daring to actually turn around and look at her.

“Yeah, she invited us to come here,” Clarke confirmed. “Maybe you can explain why she made me promise not to mention it to you, though. Cause she was almost annoyingly tight-lipped about it.”

“Yeah, that’s—” Bellamy cleared his throat and ran his hand through his hair, feeling rather nervous. “Okay, uh, would you like to go outside for a moment, we could talk more privately,” he offered and Clarke followed him through the door.

They grabbed their coats and made their way outside. Walking slowly, Bellamy led her away from the town hall, to a small park and they sat on a wooden bench, facing the building. They watched the crowd going inside for a moment before Bellamy found the courage to speak up.

“Well, uh, Octavia invited you to come here because she’s, um, figured out that it would be nice for you to visit,” he said and felt an overwhelming urge to face-palm himself because that didn’t sound at all competent.

But when he looked over at Clarke, her eyes were cast down, staring at her hand, linked on her lap. And she was blushing again. So he continued. “I told her about the trip to Boston and that I was texting you, and that we were talking about meeting again but couldn’t figure out how to make it work with our schedules, and I guess she figure out how disappointed I was.

“That I couldn’t see you, I mean,” he ploughed on. “Because I wanted to, you know. I had a lot of fun with you and I thought, maybe so did you. But I got a bit busy at school lately and I didn’t want to put pressure on you because you said you were busy, too—”

“Bellamy!” Clarke interrupted with a giggle and grabbed him hand gently. “I was disappointed, too, you know. I wanted to see you, too. Which is why I said yes the second your sister invited us here.

“Somehow, she already knew that Marcus’s mom lives here, even if I had no idea. And she’d already talked to her about her, helped her get ready to take us in for the whole holiday weekend. She presented a whole war strategy for this visit and basically said that all I had to do was inform my mother and Marcus that we’d be packing up our food and coming here. It was actually quite impressive, if a little bit scary,” Clarke accounted with a small smile. She let go of him now and put her hands into her coat pockets. She huddled into herself and moved a little closer to him. He almost put his arm around her and pulled her into his side.

“Yeah, scary efficient – that’s Octavia,” Bellamy confirmed and they both chuckled.

“So,” he prompted, “you’re staying here the whole weekend? Till Sunday?” he asked and Clarke nodded in confirmation. “And you’re staying with Mrs. Kane? I didn’t think she’d have the room to have that many people over.”

“It’s gonna be a little tight but it’s okay,” Clarke told him.

“Well, you can always stay with me,” Bellamy shot out and immediately wanted to swallow his tongue because that was way too much. “In my guest room, I mean. Well, it’s Octavia’s old room and I’ve kept the bed, so you could take it now. If you wanted to.”

Clarke didn’t say anything at first, just turned to face him and pulled her hands out. She bit her lip and searched his face before bringing her hand up and putting it on his cheek. She moved a little loser and Bellamy finally caught up. He took her face into his hands and rubbed his thumbs on her cheekbones. Clarke, still looking him in the eye, gave a tiny smile and pressed her lips against his lips.

It was short and sweet; both of their lips dry and a little chapped from the cold but she felt warm and wonderful.

“I’d love to stay with you,” she said once they parted and she got up to her feet. She extended her arm towards Bellamy and he took the hand she offered, also getting up. “We can discuss that extra bed later. But now, let’s go.” She pulled him gently towards the city hall. “Before they eat all the food.”

Yes, Bellamy Blake had always love the Arkadia Thanksgiving feast. But this one was quickly becoming his favourite one yet.

**Author's Note:**

> always read everything you sign and always ask for a lawyer when detained by the police.
> 
> and come find me on tumblr (@ [carrieeve](http://carrieeve.tumblr.com)). kudos and comments will be welcomed like manna! :)


End file.
